Joothan: The Eventful Journey of a Dalit Man from Dust to a Man of Substance

Abstract

A Dalit is a victim of the inexorable caste-system. He has no self respect and is treated like an animal by the members of the upper-caste. A careful observation of a Dalit’s life reveals that a Dalit woman is someone who gets doubly marginalised. On one hand, she is victimised by a frustrated Dalit man while on the other she gets subdued by the caste-centric society. The curse of untouchability has led to the physical repression of the Dalits. With the passage of time, many dalits have raised their voices to change the system. Dalit autobiography is one such medium of protest. It has enriched literature by expressing things related to the varna system. Omprakash Valmiki’s Joothan is an earnest attempt through which he has registered his protest against a compassionless society manipulated by casteism. The current paper makes an attempt to study Joothan (2007), a Dalit autobiography that shows a man’s suffering and struggle to establish his identity as a member of the society. The paper explores the ways in which the writer has presented his eventful life through various incidents that had shaped his personality. The book is life itself as in every page, the author has given us a thorough description of Dalit life and the challenges associated with it.